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USER MANUAL

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Index

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First look at Moodle, What is Moodle?

Basic utilization

Moodle icons and their meaning

Home page description

Settings

Messaging

Change password

Assignments

Forums

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First look at Moodle.What is Moodle?

Moodle is an educational platform designed to offer courses and virtual communities services through the Internet. The tool allows us to:

Present educational material in the form of lessons, works, exercises, question-naires, etc.Provide informational resources such as forums, chats, audio, video, web pages, etc.Offer activities where students can interact with each other or with the tutor.As a participant, this platform will let you share and integrate the virtual learning experience using the tools presented bellow.

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(Appearance of the Virtual Classroom homepage)

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Basicutilization

• On the left side of the homepage, you will see three sections: Navigation, Settings and Calendar:

•This button let us edit each one of the sections mentioned before, add and hide tools. Positioning the mouse over the red squares will display the edit buttons.

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1. When Clicking on “Site pages” you will be able to select two options

2. In “Tags” we can search for keywords in the homepage, in “Calendar” a screen will display where you will be able to see your courses’ events and you can add your own events (since the course has a calendar the usage of this tool is up to your tutor’s discretion)

3. To create a new event you willhavetofilloutthefieldsrequired by the system

Whenclicking“Myprofile”youwill see three options4.

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5. Whenclicking“Viewprofile”apartofyourprofileinformationwilldisplayas shown in the image

When clicking “Forum posts” you will be directed you to your messages in forums and discussions

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When clicking “Messages” you will be directed to a screen that contains your conversations and contacts

When clicking in “My courses” you will be directed to the links of the courses where you are registered

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Moodle Icons and their meaning

The following are the descriptions of the different icons you can find in the virtualclassroom. Take into account that this information will help you have a better comprehension and take advantage of the resources that will be assigned to each course of the Educational Portal of the Americas.

The “Chat” activity allows participants to have a live text conversation.The chat can be a one-time activity or it can be done at the same time every day or weekly. Chat sessions will be saved and can be published as public, so everyone can see it, or be limited to the users with permission to see the chat history.Chats are especially useful when a group has no possibility to meet physically to speak face to face, such as:

•Scheduledmeetings for online coursesstudents. Thechat option let themshareexperiences with other students of the same course but from different cities or countries.

•A student that is temporary unable to attend class can chatwith the tutor to beupdated on the class subjects and homework.

•Students that are starting towork canmeet to discuss their experiences amongthemselves and with a tutor.

•Smallchildrenathomeintheafternoonsasamonitoredintroductiontotheworldofsocial media.

•A“questionsandanswers”sessionwithaguestspeakerfromadistantplace.Sessions to help students prepare themselves for exams, where tutors and students can participate.

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The module activity “forum” allow participants to have synchronized discussions that take place for a long period of time.There are different types of forums to choose from, such as: the standard forum where any person can start a new discussion at any moment; a forum where each student can start a unique discussion; or and “questions and answers” forum in which students have to participate before being able to see the messages from other students.Thetutorcanallowfilestobeattachedascontributionstotheforum.Attached images are shown in the forum as messages. Participantscansubscribetoreceivenotificationsofnewmessagesintheforum.The tutor can establish the subscription mode as: optional, forced, auto, or prohibited subscriptions.Ifnecessary,studentscanberestrictedtopublishonlyaspecificamount of messages in a certain timeframe; this will allow the discussions to be more balanced. Tutorsorstudentscanevaluatethemessagesintheforum.Classificationscanbeaddedtoafinalgradeandregisteredinthegradebook.Forums have multiple usages, such as:

• Asocialspaceforstudentstogettoknoweachother• Aplacetopostthenoticesrelatedtothecourse(usingthenewsforumwithforced subscription)• Aplacetodiscussthecontentofthecourseorlecturematerial• Aplacetocontinueonlineanissuepreviouslyproposedinafacetofacesession• Avenuefordiscussionbetweentutorsfromthecourse(usingahiddenforum)• Asanassistancecenterwheretutorsandstudentscangiveadvices• Asasupportareaforone-to-onecommunicationsbetweenstudentandtutor(using a forum with divided groups and with one student per group)• Forcomplementaryactivities,suchasbrainstormingwherestudentscanreflectandproposeideas

Forum

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SCORMpackage

A “SCORM package”isasetoffilesthatareattachedunderastandardnormforlearning purposes. The SCORM module activity allows us to upload and add SCORM orAICCaswellzipfilestothecourses.The content usually is shown in many pages, with navigation between pages. There are many options to visualize the content, with pop-up windows, content tables, navi-gation buttons, etc. SCORM activities generally include qualifying questions, registe-red in the grade book.

SCORM activities can be used for:

• Presentationofmultimediaandanimationcontent• Asanevaluationtool(Thisistheiconwhereyoucanfindthemultimediaversionofthecoursesyouhavesubscribed.)

“Homework” module allows teachers to evaluate students by creating assignments that are going to be checked, evaluated and rated.

Thistoolallowsyoutopresentanydigitalcontent,suchastextfiles,spreadsheets,images, audio, and video, among others. Alternatively or as an additional homework students can be required to write directly in the textbox used for editing text.

Teacherscanleavefeedbackanduploadfilessuchascommentnotesoraudiocomments. Assignments can be rated in a numeric scale or in a personalized scale. Final grades are registered in the grade book.

Assignment

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This icon represents the activity “Lesson”, it lets the tutor present content and / or practical activities in an interesting andflexibleway. A tutor can use the lesson tocreate a linear way of content pages or educational activities that offers the student many options. In any case, tutors can choose to increase student participation and ensure the understanding through the inclusion of different types of questions such as multiple choices or open-ended questions. Depending on the student’s answer and the way the tutor provide the lesson, students are allowed to go to the next page, go back to a previous page or go to a totally different itinerary.

A lesson can be rated and the grade registered in the grade book.Lessons can be used for:

• Self-guidedlearningonanewsubject• Exercisesbasedinscenariosordecisionmakingsimulations• Reviewpreviouslypresentedcoursematerial

It’simportanttoremarkthatinthistoolyouwillfindthemobileversionforthecoursethat you have enrolled.

Lesson

WikiThe icon “Wiki” allows students to add and edit a collection of webpages. A wiki can be collaborative (anyone can edit it) or individual (only one person can edit it).Wikis have many uses, for example:

• Togenerateclassnotesinacollaborativewayamongallstudents• Forteacherstoplanastrategyoraworkmeetinginateam• Forstudentsworkinginteamsreadinganonlinebookandcreatingcontentforasubject chosen by their tutors • Forthecollectivenarrativeorcreationofagrouppoesywhereeachparticipantwrite a line or a verse• Asapersonal journalorfortakingnotesforexamsandsummaries(personalWiki)

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descriptionHome page

When you enter the Virtual Classroom of the Educational Portal, the following page will display:

(Inthispageyouwillfindthecoursesthatyouarecurrentlyenrolled.)

In the left side of the webpage you will find theparticipants “Rules”, the “Technical Requirements” for the correct operation of the platform in your PC, and the “Novelties of the site”

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In the lower left side of the page are the sec-tions “Settings” and “Calendar”.

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Settings

When clicking the “My Profile settings” two other options will display: “Edit profile” and “Messaging”, both of them have different characteristics.

When selecting “Edit profile” you will be directed to a screen where you can edit your profile.Notethatyouhavetobecarefulwhenmakingchangesinthefieldsrequiredby the system.

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In this section you can edit your personal interests, add a user picture, and write a detailed description about you. It also allows you to add your contact information in case you want to share it.

How to upload a userpicture to your profile

To upload your profile image youjust have to drag the image you want from your PC to the indicated box. You can also select the option add, a new window will display, select the file and click “Upload this file”

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Whenyoufinishmakingchangesinyourpersonal information,remembertoselectthe option “Update profile” for the system to save the changes.

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Messaging

When clicking “messaging” a range of options will display and will allow you to modi-fythenotificationsmethodsfortheincomingmessages.

Whenfinishingthemessagingconfiguration,remembertoselect“Updateprofile”forchanges to be registered in the system.

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Changepassword

To change the password it is necessary to access the homepage of the Educational Portal of the Americas www.educoas.org and look for the option “log-in” located in the upper left side of the homepage.

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Type your username and password, then press the Log-in button.

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Select the option “View and / or Edit My Profile” and the next form will display.

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Click on the “Change Password” option.

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Insert your “current password”, then insert your new “password”andtypeitagaininthenextfield.Please note that your password has to meet the following requirements:

• Tohaveatleastaminimumofeight(8)characters• Tohaveatleastaletter• Tohaveatleastonenumber• Tohaveatleastaspecialcharacter(@#$%&*+)

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If the process is successfully finished,you will be redirected to the previous page. There you will see that the fieldto confirm your e-mail is empty. It is very important to add your E-mail once again for the changes to be saved in the system correctly.

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Tofinish,selecttheoption:“send”locatedinthebottompartofthewebpage.

If the password reset is successfully done the following message will appear on the screen.

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Assignments

How to upload anassignment to the Platform?

The following video guides you through the process of how to upload an assignment to the platform.

To see the video on Youtube click here:http://youtu.be/YufWoVVl3AU

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Forums

How to have access to a course’s forum?

To have access to the forums located in the lessons you have to select the course and scroll to the icon forum

Once selected, a tutor’s introduction will display along with the topics of the forum’s discussions.

Remember, to have access to the forum you have to select the topic in the left side of the screen.

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How to participatein the forum?To answer a tutor’s questions in a forum just select the option “Reply” located at the bottom part of the message.

Then type your answer in the textbox: “Your reply”

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Then click the button “Mail now” to let the tutor know about your reply in the forum, to finishtheprocesspress“Post to forum”

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Educational Portal of the AmericasOrganization of American States

1889 F St. N.W. Washington www.educoas.org

D.C.20006